Bavarian Open

So the prize money has brought all the pilots out of the woodwork for this one.  The Austrian National team is here as well as most of the top German pilots.  The site is a north to north east facing mountain bordering on the flat lands north of the alps.  I am told Hochisse is a tricky site to get up and away from.  Since it faces north it turns on late but you can’t wait too long otherwise the strong northery Bavarian wind kicks in and messes things up.

 

To get to launch here you have to take 2 separate ski lifts up the mountain.  The first one is a single person chair lift and you either hold your glider on your shoulder or in a removable cradle the operator hooks to the side of the chair.  The second ride up is a large gondola with gliders jammed in every corner of the cable car.  The first guy I watched load onto the chair just sat down with the glider on his shoulder so I did the same.  Halfway up I figured out he was just doing that to be macho because all the other pilots had cradles to hold their gliders.  Macho BS aside, the shoulder demands a cradle next time!

 

There are 2 launches up top, one NE and one N (I think).  The rigids and a few flex wings set up on the easier NE launch and the rest go to the N launch.  Most of the morning the winds are over the back but by 12 it is blowing in lightly.  A task was set for a 153k triangle back into the Alps with most pilots concerned about the last leg coming back against the late day winds.  Once launch opens a small handful of gliders gets off around the corner but at our launch no one is budging.  Cycles are good and gliders are climbing slowly around the corner.  Standing there I noticed about 50 swallows darting around to the west of launch while at the same time a good cycle cranked up.  One pilot sat through a minute of the best launchable air all morning messing with his vario and just watching the streamers flutter.  I was speechless.  Hanz and Jorge, two top german pilots saw I was anxious to get off and quickly encouraged around them to the front of the line.  They wanted a wind dummy.  I wasted no time and headed straight west down the spine where the birds had been.  At the corner of the first big saddle came my broken bubbly reward.  It was tricky snarly one but plenty strong to climb quickly.  As I got clear of the ridge it was obvious that the death gaggle in front of the main launch was stuck all at the same level.  I was relieved to have nothing to do with that chaos. 

 

The first small ridge over the back had a cloud so I quickly left stress behind and got on course.  The deeper into the Alps we flew the more clouds there were to show us the way.  Most of the thermals were short lived but finding their upwind brothers was pretty standard.  Traveling south the mountains get taller quickly and about 30k out came the big crossing.  “Wild Emperor”  is a short ridge of about a dozen different granite peaks.  Sheer, rugged, it juts almost straight up out of the mountains below.  The ridge of this one elicits all sorts of dramatic comparisons like shark jaws or God’s Saw Blade.  However I describe it, justice will not be served.  It reminded me of the high peaks back in the Owen’s Valley only more sheer, more rugged, and bigger.  I knew I needed to get high to cross them, but at the same time I was for some reason scared to get higher.  It was a weird feeling for me because height usually has the opposite reaction and is very comforting.   The last couple thermals were stronger and quite a bit rougher then usual so I am sure that caused the tension.  I glided over with a few other pilots at the same time, one flex and a couple of rigids.  The flex was a bit lower and cruised through the biggest keyway you have EVER seen.  I wish I had a camera but I know I wouldn’t have had the balls to unglue my fingers from the speed bar gliding over that puppy.  Something told me I was going to fly straight into a ripper on the other side.   It was tight, it was strong, and it broke through the inversion to get me over 3,200m which was a nice buffer for the long glide.  The glides are so long here that even when conditions are strong I find myself flying not much over best glide to assure myself a good arrival height.  The inversions cap all but the strongest thermals so the glides are very smooth for such long distances it is eerie.   

 

This task was an open start again and I was behind the leaders.  This gave me a few pilot markers on course so I was content.  Finding lift here is different then other places I have flown so I am not comfortable leading or flying alone.  I just can’t move as fast and I fear getting corned with a bad decision.  The cores are shifty, rough, and don’t last very long.   I can usually use this to my advantage and tighten up when its good to get away from the mellow thermallers and the rigids.

 

After the second turnpoint  I glided on with (false) confidence.  Ahead 4 valleys came together with a bump in the middle and beyond that was a tall mountain with clouds on top.  I guess I didn’t search hard enough in the valley, instead I just cruised through when I didn’t find anything obvious.  Trying to get on the shoulder of the big mountain I got the biggest lee dump ever.  2,500 m in just a few minutes.  I hit a couple lee side thermals but they didn’t feel substantial enough to turn in.  Felt more like rotor actually.  I hit the deck on the other side of ole big Lee in the confluence of 3 valleys.   A few minutes later a rigid wing got up on the opposite side of the valley I had just flown through.  I have to admit part of me was annoyed but most of me was just plain happy.  If he hadn’t come along and spanked me like that, I wouldn’t have learned the right thing to do, only the wrong.

 

I packed up and walked into town looking for some sort of nourishment.  I found a party behind a hotel where some nice Austrian youths who spoke a few words of English offered me a beer.  Empty stomach, euro beer, you can do the math.  Digging my harness out of the woods where I had stashed it, I tripped on nothing and fell down in some sort of death weed.   Kinda like the cactus of the weed family.  Fire weed or something.  My arms were on fire for awhile but I was too buzzed to care ;)

 

Great day

 

Kev